


The Truth of the Thing

by AraSigyrn



Category: Sahara (2005)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-26
Updated: 2010-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-06 17:34:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AraSigyrn/pseuds/AraSigyrn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So, Dirk got his beach and the girl and Al got a new football. But was that really the end?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Truth of the Thing

It only took a week.

In retrospect, Eva was surprised it had lasted that long. Seven days of beautiful weather, the isolated beach and deep aquamarine sea. Seven days of idling around, sprawling on the sand or swiming together. It should have been idyllic and certainly, the few local people who passed were free with knowing winks and slight, tolerant smiles.

"The honeymoon before the wedding." one old lady had said to the local shop-keeper before realising Eva was there. Eva had smiled politely and bought her shopping with the normal chatter, but inside, her guts twisted.

She hadn't really thought about it until that moment, still riding the tide of adrenaline and excitement but suddenly it tormented her. She'd asked Dirk along because she couldn't face coming here alone. Not with Frank's death so close, so real. He'd never come to the house - which was probably a good thing at the moment, as she wouldn't have been able to face coming back here. Another not-quite-realisation and another guilty knot tightened in her stomach.

She thought - she'd _assumed_ \- that Dirk understood why she'd needed his company. A maverick, a reckless daredevil who had nothing in common with Frank except a good heart and intentions, he'd been a way to forget that one, nightmarish moment in a narrow, dank well. And he was a genuinely attractive guy - warm, friendly, funny and ...well, she _was_ only human and as suspectible to eye-candy as the next woman. But most of all, he'd been **safe**. The kind of man who would fool around a little but wouldn't be planning for a stable home and 2.whatever kids.

The old woman's words made her wonder. Could she have gotten it horribly, horribly wrong?

She spent the next three days listening to Dirk talk. He needed very little encouragement really, and what he said made her relax. Every second sentence started with some varient of the words "So Al and me..". He changed when he talked about his partner, white teeth flashing and hands waving. There was affection there but, Eva wondered, was there more?

One week almost to the minute after they arrived, she got her answer.

They were sunbathing - sprawled on recliners at the back of the house with salt still drying into their hair. Dirk had gone in for drinks - too much the gentleman to make her leave her recliner - and she had been drowsing in the late afternoon sun. Then she heard a crash inside the house. Memories of the plant and the heart-stopping time in the Texas brought her up and moving before the sound really registered. She padded into the kitchen and stopped.

Dirk had the phone pressed to his ear, shoulders hunched and free hand raking through his hair as he listened to the person on the other end. A glass of red wine stood on the counter beside the bottle, another glass lying in fragments on the tiled floor. Eva frowned and looked for the dustpan and brush. She kept an ear on what she could hear of the one-sided conversation but the reception sounded appalling.

The glass and wine were quickly mopped up and she sat on one of the wicker chairs, watching Dirk pace back and forth. She almost didn't recognise the carefree treasure-hunter with his face pale and a frown replacing his normal smile. The near silence stretched out and Eva began to fidget until finally Dirk nodded and said "Okay. I'll grab my things and be on the next flight. Yeah, see ya there."

The click of the phone hanging up seemed to kill every other bit of background noise. Eva looked at him - for the first time since he'd rescued her at the lighthouse, Dirk looked genuinely worried. "What is it?"

He raked his hands back through his hair. "It's..._dammit!_...it's Al. Stupid son of a bitch was diggin' up the Texas and one of Kazim's old troops got the jump on him." He nodded to the phone. "That was the Admiral telling me about it. They can't evac him at the moment, it's all politics now so he thought I should know, y'know, next-of-kin and crap 'cause the Embassy wants to keep it quiet 'til things calm down."

"You're his next of kin? Really?" It was a stupid thing to say, but Eva was trying to fit the idea that Al - the unflappable, indestructable Al who'd crawled into the heart of a super-heat furnace and spent most of the time she'd known him dodging bullets, missiles and grenades - had been hurt during a innocent dig.

Dirk waved a hand absently. "Yeah, have been since the Marines. But _fuck_! Stupid ass mother-! I leave him alone for one fucking week and he gets himself shot. Dammit! I shoulda known better. He can't even tie his own tie for Chrissakes! Never shoulda let him off on his own."

There was more, quite a lot more in fact, but Eva wasn't paying attention. It was a good thing she was sitting anyway as her legs went weak with the force of her relief. She was and had been right. Best friends might talk like they did. The length of the friendship might explain the call but one look at Dirk's ruffled hair, pale face and the real worry in his eyes and she _knew_.

"Do you want to grab a shower before you head out?"

* * *

Al Gorgino was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a happy person right now. He was sick of the desert, sick of tiptoeing around the lackadaisical river and the bay and sick of trying to dig the iron monstrousity out of the sand-bank.

The bandages wrapped around his torso and shoulders were not helping his mood. Neither was the fact that the NUMA crew were almost all people he didn't know too well and most were visibly disappointed that Dirk wasn't there. He was also annoyed at the new medic who'd taken one look at the wound and tried to order him off the site altogether.

Then the crane had broken...and he'd reopened the wound trying - and suceeding - to fix it. The medic'd got a needle in him and now he couldn't trust his own damn feet.

So he was sitting on the gundeck, propped against the cannon that had fired the decisive shot and feeling sorry for himself. The rest of the crew were supervising the crating of the bones below and arguing over whether or not a flag was justified this time. He sighed and tipped his head back against the cannon, which was lying on its side for some reason and the pain pills were making everything hazy and...

He halfway roused when Dirk dropped through the hatch to the deck and roused enough to grumble that his partner would get his neck broke one of these days pulling those damn fool stunts and why was he bothering anyhow, there weren't any damsels in distress here?

His good arm was pulled across Dirk's shoulder and he was hoisted to his feet. "No, but I always did prefer my own damned fool. Easier to impress."

He might have said something, but the pain was dim now, and he was moving and Dirk was there and he was tired so Al slumped against his partner and allowed him to guide his stumbling steps as they headed out together. He could feel the rumble of barely suppressed laughter and closed his eyes.

It'd be a while before he lived this one down.


End file.
